When I tell people I've seen a mermaid in Walesheba Creek, people often just chuckle and say I've been out in the woods too long. The more uncharitable souls will tell me it's time for me to finally settle down and find me a life because I'm just seeing things. But I tell you, that there is a mermaid that lives in the Walesheba Creek and she is a real man eater. Now I've only encountered her once, and that was way back in two thousand and fifteen. I was fifteen years old then, and fancied myself an avid hunter and fisherman. I also fancied myself as something of a fossil collector. 

You see, a long time ago, thousands of years ago this whole region used to be the floor of a sea or so the old folks have told me. Indeed that is what makes the soil of this region so rich. And well being the floor of the sea it makes sense that over the course of thousands of years a lot of fish died and their bones settled on the floor of this massive sea, that the passage of time and the layering of silt and such on top compressed them down and turned them into fossils. Now I'm no college professor and I've never attended a fancy university.

All that I know has come from one source, and that is my deluxe edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. When the Russians cut us off from the Internet and the Chinese finally buy out Google, the few remaining sets of those encyclopedias would be worth their weight in gold. Mark my words.

Anyway it was a fine, cloudless Summer’s day in the year two thousand and fifteen. I decided to check out Walesheba Creek,  mainly because word was that the recent Spring rains had uncovered a treasure trove of fossils and people were picking up all manner of things. Anything from shark teeth to petrified wood. Some were even claiming to find small traces of gold. That alone was enough to get my blood boiling and for me to get my gear together.

But the icing on the cake was this, now according to one local fisherman who had claimed to have seen it with his own eyes, there was a massive treasure trove of lost Confederate gold had been uncovered by the spring rains and he intended to secure that cache come hell or high water. I would like to note at the time he was drunk as a skunk. Looking bad he had to be drunk, because only a drunk man would brag about uncovering a cache of gold worth millions of dollars. 

Now where was I? Oh yes, Walesheba is nothing much to look at, at least it's not from the highway where I started from. You see when it runs under the highway it's really nothing more than a tiny stream. Hell I've seen ditches hold more water than it holds when it runs under the highway. But if you follow that tiny little trickle of water East toward the hills that ring this town, you will soon find that tiny streams seem to widen and cut through massive gullies and hollows.

It took about half an hour of trekking along that stream till I first started to notice its true might. I think I covered half a mile that first thirty minutes into my hike. As I walked I passed dozens of tiny houses, most of them looked like old wooden cabins, buildings that belonged in the mountains and not in the hill country of Central Mississippi. 

Then it happened, as if in a blink of an eye I entered into a different world. As I followed the stream I came to a deep gully.  I remember the slopes of the gully were covered with thick patches of river cane.  Where before I could catch a breeze, how I could barely breathe. Sweat rolled down my chin and my breathing became hard and laborious . The sun beamed down on me, there was not a cloud in the sky and worst of all thirst started to settle in. Yes, even though I was walking next to a stream, thirst had settled in. 

Now before you go jumping on your high horse and say 'Well Joe. You had a source of fresh flowing water now more than a few feet from ya. Surely you could have bent down and drank from that stream and that would have been one less of a problem you had to deal with'. Yes before you say that, let me tell you something, the water  in this creek is not fit to drink, it is not fit for either man or beast. At least I don't think it is, I've never been brave enough to try it.

Anyway I kept following the streaming, growing more dishearten with each step I took.  So far my hunt had been a bust. I had seen neither hair of any fossil since starting my search. And I was getting pretty tired of being an all you can eat buffet to the clouds of dark dotted mosquitoes that seemed to dart around me, and plus I was getting sunburned and the idea of dying of thirst in the deep woods was not all that appealing . 

Nevertheless I pressed on and soon I came to a wide open space. The gully had given away to a wide open space. I remember whistling through my teeth as I peered up at the rock face that greeted me. I will always remember that rock face, it must have been at least ninety feet and straight down too. And the surface was smooth as velvet. A rock climber dream if you will, but I was no rock climber.

Anyway as I shifted my eyes from rock face to the stream I noticed, much to my amazement I spotted a woman, she appeared to be around my age, and well she was beautiful, her hair was the same color as the Sun, no it put the Sun to shame. It was more like the color of wheat. And her face was perfectly formed oval with eyes that seemed to twinkle like the stars in the night sky. And her eyes, they were perfect almond shape, and their color, as blue as Sapphire. 

And then the cherry on the ice cream sundae, she was nude, she wore no top, and her perky, perfectly formed breast set my blood boiling. I remember she smiled at me, and I caught sight of her teeth, they were as white as pearls and perfectly formed. I found myself starting to rush toward her. I dropped my gear and rushed toward her. She smiled and then slipped off the rock she was sitting on, like an otter she slipped into this deep pool, that was so deep I could not see the bottom.

The pool was a perfectly formed circle within this canyon I found myself standing in, the water was a deep, deep blue color kind of like the color of the ocean or the sea and like I said so deep you could not see the bottom.  I was just about to join her for a swim when something told me to stop.

I don't know why, but I noticed that instead of a pair of legs she was flipping a tail, a tail that looked like a fish tail. And the moment I stopped was the moment a sudden and dramatic change came over her, she went from smelling to snarling, I then noticed her hands, her hands seemed like fins. And then her teeth. Her teeth grew sharper and started to look more like fangs than teeth.

And her eyes, her eyes went from peaceful blue to a red, a red color that reminded me of blood. And her hair, her hair went from golden to greenish with tints of blue woven in. 

I turned upon my heel and I started to run. I ran, like my life depended on it. I dared not look behind me. I did not know what that creature was, and I was not sticking around to find out. And so I ran, I dropped my gear because it was slowing me down. And once I reached my old truck, I pushed my foot down upon the petal and burned up the highway.

And that is my story. If you doubt me, you can always go down and see for yourself. I'll go with you as far as the bridge and I'll point you in the direction you need to travel. But that is far as I'm willing to go. Cause I think that creature or woman is still there. Waiting for her next meal.